﻿Local residents will be aware of the boarded up, tatty buildings on the Crawley Road opposite the Millennium Hall. They have been in that condition for some time and their shabby appearance makes the whole area look run down. There are also safety concerns with reports of children getting inside.

The buildings were purchased a few years ago by the Guinness Trust, a housing association who provide affordable homes. They intended to clear the site and redevelop it with some attractive and much needed housing for local people.

Unfortunately, due to the recession, they have nothad the money to do anything with the site. Simon and Roy want to see something done about this and will be putting pressure on those responsible.

As a temporary measure, until the redevelopment can happen, we would like to see the site cleared, and possibly used for parking. We have got the council’s solicitor involved to help with this and hope to have the same success with removing this eyesore as we did getting the burnt out office building near the station cleared.

It is a shame that some people think it is alright to throw litter. Although the council has to pick it up it isn’t the Councils litter, it belongs to the inconsiderate people who drop it.

The Parish Council employs a Litter Warden who is responsible for Roffey. If you are aware of any particular problem spots, please let us know and we will arrange for the Litter Warden to visit the area.

Roy recently took part in a Horsham in Bloom clean up event in the Oak Tree Way and Redkiln Way area. The picture shows just some of the bags of rubbish collected. However, returning to the area three weeks later it was disappointing to see that it had returned to its original state, very frustrating.

HDC is working with the probation service to see if some people can be used to pick up litter as part of “community payback”, subject of course, to proper supervision and training. If re-elected in May, the Conservatives will invest more in street cleaning and see if outsourcing it would give taxpayers better value for money.

If you have been wondering what the council has done for you recently, we have put together a list of just some of their achievements in the four years since the last elections. See this link:achievements

﻿You may have seen the “Horsham and District Herald”, published by the Liberal Democrats. With such an excellent record of success we never resort to negative campaigning and it is disappointing to see other do so. However, we feel we should set the record straight on some of the issues raised.

•The projected overspend they refer to for last December’s budget will actually be an under spend, unable to quantify yet as the final figures are not all in.
•They refer to a £500,000 over spend for the previous year’s budget, this did occur on the Acron Plus project but they do not say this. They specifically refer to the ‘Council’s budget. The council’s budget was under spent by £380,000! This is the audited figure.
•Acorn plus is an award winning scheme welcomed by a huge majority of the residents, it is highly successful in environmental terms, enjoyed a well managed introduction on the ground and saves significant money to boot. Horsham District residents were given a new free bin and weekly waste collections are maintained! Our green waste collections are free. Most other councils charge!
•Leisure charges rose roughly with the rate of inflation and took into account increased Vat etc. They are still very competitive. Burial charges rose by around 11.0% but started from a level a lot lower than cost and in Horsham District they are still the lowest in West Sussex and Surrey! The changes were debated and approved democratically at full council, with little comment from our opposition.
•Horsham and District Herald contains a yellow panel with 8 things they will do if elected. Horsham Conservatives have been doing all these things effectively and efficiently for years, even decades!
•According to the Horsham and District Herald the Lib Dems have sorted out the banks. In Horsham the Conservatives concentrate on local services for local people! Conservatives have cut the council budgets by around 18% with no significant cuts in services!
• In Horsham District we enjoy one of the lowest council taxes, with 0% promised for the next 2 years, for one of the highest levels of service in the UK.

﻿Many thanks to everyone who completed and returned the questionnaire we gave out with our March “In Touch”. We got a huge response which is excellent.

73% of respondents thought that the council tax represents good value money and 58% thought that the town was either slightly or considerably cleaner and greener than it was 4 years ago.

Areas of concern for people included inconsiderate parking, with particular problems in Oak Tree Way. Whilst this is not an easy problem to solve, we think that the removal or re-sitting of the recycling point would help alleviate congestion in the area and also improve the look of the place as people seem to be dumping rubbish there.

The other big issue people raised was the number of potholes in the roads. Road maintenance is the responsibility of West Sussex County Council and it is a difficult area to deal with due to the budget cuts being imposed on local councils but we will continue to ensure that Roffey get its fair share of the available resources.